What’s on in York: Illuminating York Minster, 26th – 29th October

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Illuminating York is back and set to be more innovative than ever in 2016. Jason Bruges Studio are creating a choreographed light work for York Minster.

This ticketed event offers festival-goers a unique opportunity to experience and explore York Minster by night in an entirely new way.

Jason Bruges Studio are internationally renowned for producing innovative installations, interventions and ground breaking works including the dynamic illumination of The Shard (London) for New Year’s Eve countdown in 2014.

For York Minster they are creating an immersive experience – working as ‘light masons’ they will orchestrate moving beams of light to create new shapes and spaces within the cavernous nave of the Minster.

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Adult:£8
Child: £3.50
Family (2 adults 2 children): £20 (saving £3 on the late ticket price)

Groups of 30+ get a free adult ticket for every ten adults.

What’s on: Illuminating York Festival

Wed 28 – Sat 31 Oct

The 10th Illuminating York Festival will be a treat for audiences to York this autumn.

Curated for the first time by Artistic Directors, this year’s Festival will be both beautiful and playful with immersive experiences, trails of light and the chance to discover York by night.

The city will play host to intriguing and cutting edge artworks, whilst other key attractions around the city are also joining in with a Festival Fringe.

Taking inspiration from previous years, this year’s programme is designed to engage, enthral, and intrigue audiences.

Inspired by the Festivals own history and in the UNESCO Year of Light, the 2015 Illuminating York Festival celebrates light in all of its forms from sunlight to artificially generated light, from flickering flame to the light emitting diode.

With site specific light based artworks, illuminated routes through this beautiful historic city, and another great supporting programme from world-class visitor attractions and restaurants, visitors are invited to explore York after dark.

Don’t forget to follow us on twitter @IlluminateYork

For more information please see www.illuminatingyork.org

Illuminating York makes comeback

This year’s Illuminating York event is proving to be popular with residents and visitors alike.

After a slow start (probably the result of the bad publicity following last years poor show) ticket sales are increasing.

This despite the increase in prices with children being discouraged from attending the paid for events at Cliffords Tower and in the Museum Gardens.

The Councils budget for the event is understood to be £175,000 with the Arts Council contributing £73,000 of this.

Budget click to enlarge

Free events like the illuminated A4 locos at the railway Museum are very popular.

Until 2011, the costs of the event were all covered by sponsorship. The new Labour Council introduced admission charges although the total costs of staging the event remained broadly the same.

The event continues tonight (Friday) and tomorrow (Saturday)

Ticket details can be found here.

Concern over Illuminating York 20% price hike

Liberal Democrats have raised concerns that ticket prices for this year’s Illuminating York Festival have significantly increased despite the 2012 event being branded a “disappointment”.

Illuminating York 2013

The Labour run City of York Council introduced charging for the – previously free – event last year. There were complaints about the £5 admission charge while Vic Reeves’ ‘Wonderland’ production received a backlash of negative comments and poor reviews.

However, the admission charges and £26,000 contribution from council funds meant the event made a £16,000 ‘profit’ which Labour promised would be “invested in next year’s event”.

Many hoped that this promise would see a return to the previous free admissions policy.

However, this year’s event, which will runs from October 30th – November 2nd, sees admission charges for the overall festival for adults increase from £5 to £6 and for under 16s from £1 to £5, with under 5’s still going free.

This means that a family of four, with two school-age children, would see their ticket costs rise by a whopping 83%.

The increase has been described as contrary to the Labour Leaders statements about the need to control the cost of living

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